


Kids These Days

by apollos



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: F/M, Humor, Sibling Bonding, The Talk, Walking In On Someone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-30
Updated: 2017-10-30
Packaged: 2019-01-26 16:46:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12561792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apollos/pseuds/apollos
Summary: Between fighting monsters and catching her little brother doing that with his girlfriend, Nancy would rather have the monsters.Or: Mike and Eleven start to explore; Nancy deals with her brother growing up; Jonathan is the least helpful boyfriend ever (but not really.)





	Kids These Days

It all starts with Dungeons & Dragons.

With Lucas on vacation, Dustin in summer camp and Max visiting her dad for the summer, Mike, Will and El didn't have enough players for a game. Will had really been wanting to play and had roped Jonathan into it, who had then enlisted Nancy. It sounded like something fun and light to do in between shifts at her summer job, so she rolled an elf fighter character and played a few sessions with them. The last session had been yesterday, and she'd left her keys in the basement. She blamed Jonathan for that, as well—he'd been unusually playful during the game, goosing her and nipping at her neck when he thought the others weren't looking, and she'd been so distracted when it came time to disband that her keys had fell out of her purse and she didn't realize they were missing until this afternoon when she was about to go shopping with Ally.

She definitely did  _not_ expect to see her little brother and El engaged in something they should definitely  _not_ be doing, not at the age of fourteen. She would never be able to erase the image of El's head between her  _little brother's_ legs—or worse, the face Mike was making. Or the sounds. Oh God, the sounds.

"Get  _out_!" Mike screamed when he saw her, suddenly stilled.

And as soon as she backed away from the door, El slammed it shut with her psychic powers.

Nancy did not go to the mall that day.

* * *

 "I mean, they're  _fourteen_ , Jonathan! That's so young."

"I don't know, Nancy." They were sitting on Jonathan's car, parked on a dead-end road and looking up at the stars together. A typical summertime date, usually followed by backseat sex, though Nancy was definitely not in the mood tonight. "Most boys at age fourteen want blowjobs, and if they're lucky enough to find a girl to do it—"

"I cannot take this," Nancy groaned, putting her head in her hands.

"I'm just teasing." Jonathan laughed lightly and rubbed Nancy's back. "I agree, they're too young. I'd limit it to a handjob at age fourteen, myself."

"I  _hate_ you," Nancy said.

"And I love you too, Nancy."

"I mean, what do I do? Tell my mom? What would you do if you found Will in this situation?"

Jonathan looked up at the stars. "I just can't see Will getting himself into that," he said.

"Well, just think for a moment, Jonathan."

"I guess I would talk to him. I wouldn't tell our mom. I'd just do it myself." Jonathan looked at her. "But it's different between a brother and sister, isn't it?"

"Very much so," Nancy said. "Unless you want to talk to him about it?"

"Uh, I'll pass." Jonathan smiled. "I don't think he'd want that talk from me, anyway. My blowjob experience is solely from his older sister, after all." He smirked at her, moving a foot to touch her own. They were horny teenagers, plain and simple, and she knew what he wanted.

"What has gotten  _into_ you?" she laughed, pushing at him. "You're so…brazen."

"I guess it's just knowing that I'll be at NYU in the fall," he said, and he sounded so serious it made Nancy sad—because this problem with her brother was just ridiculous enough to confront, but the problem of Jonathan going to NYU while Nancy was going to school in Indiana was a bit too grim. Too heavy for this cartop conversation, and so she grabbed ahold of it and shifted the mood back.

"I could talk to El about it. I don't think she really has female role models." Nancy sighed. "Just—in general terms, I guess. Because I do  _not_ need to know  _anything_ in  _detail_ about my fourteen-year-old brother's sex life."

"That sounds like a good idea. The best one, really. I doubt El knows what sex even is."

"And they do not need to figure it out right now."

* * *

 Mike avoided her throughout the next week, though Nancy wasn't particularly keen to see him, either. She always thought that if somebody caught somebody it would be Mike catching her with Jonathan, or even back when she was with Steve. It never occurred to her that Mike could have— _feelings._ As far as she knew, this was about the age it really took hold in teenage boys, but out of sight is out of mind and it wasn't something for her to concern herself with. El didn't come over, either—or at least Nancy didn't see her.

When the weekly D&D session rolled around, Nancy didn't know how to act. Jonathan said that he wouldn't tell Will, but he told her yesterday that Will had asked him about a "friend" getting "experience" with a girl, which could only mean one thing. So everybody would be sitting around trying to traverse a dense jungle and fighting enemies all while aware of what had happened.

In a way, Nancy liked that this problem concerning her brother and his girlfriend was much simpler than the ones with the monsters she had faced previously. In another way, it was infinitely grosser.

As to be expected, D&D went incredibly awkwardly; Jonathan ended it prematurely claiming he wasn't feeling well, as they had discussed they would do previously if things were too unbearable. As everybody packed away the dice, Nancy got up and walked to where El was on the other side of the table. "I need to talk to you," she said, figuring there was no need to hide it. Everybody looked away from them.

"Okay," El said, looking at her. She had such a sweet face. A  _child's_ face, and her brother had—had desecrated that.

"We can go up to my room, okay?" Nancy said. "Follow me."

El did. The walk felt like it took forever, Nancy going over what to say in her mind. Where should she start? With the obvious, or in a more gentle way? Had Hopper told her anything besides the standard warnings about boys all girls got at all ages? Did El even have her period, was pregnancy a risk? Nancy was eighteen, just four years older than this girl, and she did not feel adequately prepared for this conversation.

"You want to talk about Mike," El said when Nancy shut the door to her room. She started walking around, looking at all of Nancy's things.

"Um. Yes. I do." So El would dictate where to start. Nancy waited for her to say something else, but she didn't. "I just…I…did he make you do that?" she blurted out.

El stopped moving, looking up at Nancy. "It was my idea," she said.

Nancy wanted to faint, or vomit. Instead, she sat down on her bed. This reminded her of all that she'd done herself in this room, which made her feel worse. "Where did you even learn that?" she asked.

"In a book," El said. " _Harlequin romance_."

"Oh, God."

"It's what people do when they like each other," El said. "When they…feel things."

"Oh, God," Nancy repeated. El was not wrong. "But El. That's an… _adult_ thing. And you're not an adult."

"What makes it an adult thing?"

Well, what a good goddamn question. What  _does_ make it an adult thing? "El, do you know what sex is?"

El nodded.

"And did you learn that in a book, too?"

El nodded again. "But in a medical book," she said. And then she blushed a little. "I asked Mike about it and he gave the book to me."

Nancy figured saying  _Oh, God_ for the third time was be excessive, so she just bit the inside of her cheek and kept trudging forward. She was sort of proud for her little brother for handling that in such a way. "Well, sex is an adult thing, because you can make babies from it. And because of the emotions that come with it. You're too young to handle those emotions."

"Do you have sex?" El asked.

Nancy flushed. Wasn't the answer obvious? Then again, this was El. "That isn't important," Nancy said.

"Yes, it is. You're not an adult."

"Okay, fine, some teenagers have sex. But they do it when they're older than you, okay? When they're more mature."

"We didn't have sex," El said. Nancy wished she would stop saying  _sex_ like that—she didn't want to hear it, or think about it, and El had a way of saying it like she said any other word, like  _elephant_ or  _flowerpot_ or something.

"I know that, and you shouldn't. But what you did is a  _kind_ of sex. What's wrong with just kissing? Kissing is nice." Nancy cringed. Even that was a little too much for her. But she supposed that at age fourteen, making out wasn't that big of a deal. As long as the hands stayed above the clothes, or at least the clothes didn't come fully off. That had been her experience when she was fourteen, anyway, at a birthday party with a boy in her class.

"Kissing is nice. But it doesn't feel as good. And I want to make Mike feel good." El said this like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Nancy felt that she was not making any progress, here. And she definitely wasn't interested in what made her baby brother feel good in that sense. "Look," she said, finally. "It's just not right, okay? I know you wouldn't know, but it's not how relationships work. It's why boys and girls shouldn't be left alone together until they're older. It's why you and Mike have supervision on your dates."

"I just don't understand," El said. "What's so bad about it?"

"I told you. It's the emotions. It's too much for young people to handle."

"I love Mike," El said, again as plain as if she were announcing the time or the weather.

"I know you do, El," Nancy said. She got up and went to El, put a hand on her shoulder. Maybe playing the authority figure card would work. "I just think you guys are moving a little too fast. Stick with kissing for now, okay?"

She knew it was futile, and knew it as she watched El walk out the door. She just hoped they would be smarter about it in the future. She also realized that she had forgotten to talk about birth control, or condoms, or STIs—but she hoped her little brother was at least smart and socially competent enough to be aware of that himself. Surely he knew where babies came from. The medical book—where had he gotten  _thati_?—at least gave her some hope.

* * *

 "Jonathan," Mike said, his voice a little weird.

Oh, God, Jonathan thought. He told Nancy that he wasn't going to do this, and now here Mike was, very clearly about to ask Jonathan how to do this. Will excused himself to the bathroom. Smart kid.

"Yeah?" Jonathan asked, pretending to suddenly be very interested in the Monster Manual.

"I need to talk to you."

Jonathan sighed and looked up at Mike. He was visibly nervous, wringing his thumbs. "Shoot," he said.

"Have you been with any other girl besides my sister?" Mike asked. "Like, when you were younger?"

Jonathan shook his head. "I kissed a girl on the playground in fifth grade," he said. "If that's what you mean."

"No," Mike said. He picked up a mini from the table and started fiddling with it. Jonathan recognized it as the boss they were supposed to fight this session. "Can we, uh. Pretend that you've been with somebody besides Nancy. For the sake of this conversation."

"O _kay_ ," Jonathan said. He shut the book and put it aside, leaning forward.

"So, um. What do you do. In a relationship. When. You start to… _feel_ things."

Jonathan considered this question. Well, what did you do? Jonathan had acted on them, but he was seventeen at the time. At Mike's age, he had just taken some very nice, long showers. "You know you can talk to your dad about this, right?"

Mike gave him a look and Jonathan backed down. To be fair, it was a stupid thing to say knowing Mr. Wheeler, but it was a last ditch effort.

"Alright, Mike, I know what you're talking about. And you know you're too young."

"It's just—El suggested it!" Mike cried, suddenly. He looked around. Jonathan wondered where Will was, and what he was up to, and hoped, vaguely, that it wasn't getting kidnapped by extra dimensional beings again. "And she doesn't  _know_ , she thinks it's just stuff that makes you feel good! And it is! We love each other and we want to make each other feel nice! What's so  _wrong_ with that?"

"Once you start messing with that stuff, Mike, there's no going back." Jonathan sighed and pinched his temples. "It's like an addiction. You get a taste, and it's all you want."

"That's not true," Mike protested. "It's not all I want. I want to, you know, hold her hand and stuff, too. But—if she's okay with it—and I'm okay with it—then why can't we just  _do ii_?"

"You're too young to know what you're getting yourself into," Jonathan said. "I know you think it's just  _this_ , but soon you guys are going to think the same thing about sex, and that's just not okay, okay?"

"We don't want sex yet," Mike protested. He paused for a second. "I mean, we know not to do that, yet. We're not ready."

"See what I mean? You can't play with hormones at your age. It doesn't work."

"Yeah, well, what makes  _you_ so different?" Mike gave Jonathan a pointed glare.

"Well, I was seventeen my first time," Jonathan said. "And for the teenage brain, three years is a lot longer, and a lot more normal. You're a science geek, don't you know that?"

"But if we're being safe and we love each other, where's the harm? Why did Nancy have to freak out like that? This whole thing is just so awkward." Mike flung the mini down on the board. "I just want to have a nice, normal relationship with my girlfriend."

Jonathan groaned at that, and then the groan turned into a laugh. "Your girlfriend has psychic powers and can travel between dimensions," he said.

"That doesn't mean we can't be  _normal_." God, this kid could pout. No wonder Nancy didn't care to be around him as much as Jonathan did with Will.

"Look, kid." Jonathan sighed again. "Just don't mess with that stuff yet, okay? You have a few more years. Just…take care of yourself in private, like every other fourteen-year-old boy." He cringed a little, both reliving his own years and thinking of Mike—or fuck, even his  _brother_ —engaging in such acts.

"This was a totally useless conversation," Mike spat.

"Oh, and remember condoms!" Jonathan said, as if struck by a lightning bolt. "Those are important. The pullout method sucks, believe me."

The sentence hung there for a second, and then Mike gave Jonathan the most horrified look he had seen on the kid's face, and that's taking into account what he'd seen when the real monster shit had gone down.

Jonathan, realizing what he had said, mirrored it back.

* * *

 "Well, that went miserably," Nancy said. They were back on the hood of the car and looking at the stars, but this time they were camping, a favored summer activity, beers in their hands. "I just didn't have answers."

"Me neither," Jonathan said, sighing. "Mike asked me some stuff. And it ended with me telling him about the pullout."

"Jesus Christ, really?" Nancy turned to balk at him. Between them, it was a fun inside joke—haha, remember the first time we had sex and we were so stupid and desperate and you had left your wallet with condoms in it in another room so we tried the pullout method and you ended up coming in my eye but it was so amazing we didn't care? Wasn't that great?—but to think about her  _little brother_ knowing that was too much.

"Not in detail," Jonathan clarified.

"Thank God."

"At least I got the condom thing in." He groaned and took a drink of beer.

"I got absolutely  _nowhere_ with El. Nowhere! The next thing I know, they'll be teenage parents."

"I think we can give them a little bit more credit," Jonathan said, reaching over to take Nancy's hand. "They're just kids in love. Like we were, once. Probably still are."

"Not when we were  _fourteen_. Seventeen is a huge difference. Three whole years."

Jonathan swung his beer bottle around; he had to agree with that. "Mike said they weren't ready for sex, anyway. I believe him. Fourteen is definitely too young for that, all other things be damned."

Nancy sighed and put her head on his shoulder. "When I was fourteen, boys were a complete mystery," she said. "I knew about sex, but I just couldn't conceive why two people would want it."

"Well, I think you have that part figured out," he said, laughing a little. She kicked his shin in response. "Look, I say you should just stop thinking about it and hope for the best. It's that, or tell your parents and Hopper, and then they'd probably never see each other again."

"Maybe that would be alright," Nancy said, not even believing it as she said it. She couldn't deprive her brother of that—she remembered the last time it happened. Besides, they did make each other genuinely happy.

"You don't mean that."  
  
"No, I don't."

"Because you're secretly a hopeless romantic." Jonathan grinned at her.

"I am not. You are!" She laughed as he starting to tickle her sides, which devolved, of course, into kissing.

El had a point: if it makes you feel good and you're in love, what's the problem?

But still.  _Fourteen_. Far too young. They need to be more mature, more capable of handling things as extreme as that type of physical connection. Because even when Jonathan touched her like he did now, or did back then, when they were seventeen and stupid and desperate—even she felt overwhelmed. Though in a perfectly pleasant way, like standing in a museum and seeing too many beautiful works of art to truly see any at all.

* * *

Nancy being Nancy, though, knew she could not let this go until she talked to Mike himself. One night after dinner, she went to her room and did the literal breathing exercises Jonathan had taught her, in-one-two-three-out-one-two-three, trying as best as possible to clear her mind of what she'd seen. She told herself that she and her brother both needed closure on this, or they would never be able to look at each other over their mother's mashed potatoes again.

Once sufficiently calm she left her room and went to Mike's. She was going to just open the door, but then she thought better of it and knocked, saying, "Mike, it's Nancy." He called for her to come in.

He was sitting with his ankles crossed on his bed, a book with a dumb sci-fi scene cover in his hands. She looked around at his room, at the dorky posters and the toys— _figures_ , they were supposed to call them—on his shelves. She felt calmed; this was how she thought of her little brother. She walked over to the bed and sat down by his feet.

"El told me what you guys talked about," Mike said.

"Well, Jonathan told me about your conversation."

Mike crinkled his nose. "It's pretty gross to think about you two."

"Well, imagine how I feel!" She poked his ankle and they both laughed; the awkwardness seemed to be disappearing. Since Nancy started processing her grief from Barb's death, she found that her relationship with Mike had grown stronger. It helped that he was leaving the most annoying stage that young boys go through.

"I'm sorry that you caught us. It won't happen again," Mike mumbled, and Nancy took that to mean they would be more careful in the future. "I thought you'd already left."

"I left my keys in the basement." She'd retrieved them the next day, walking a wide circle around where she'd seen them.

There was an awkward silence. Nancy stared at the cover of Mike's book, and Mike did too. Maybe she should ask him what he's reading? She didn't actually care, was the thing.

Finally, Mike said, "I just really like her."

Understatement of the millennium. "I know you do," Nancy said. "I just want you to be safe and be careful. I don't want you to get your heart broken."

"I'm not going to." Mike looked at her like she was stupid, which was refreshing, the usual shittiness in his expression.

"I want you to know that you can come to me. El, too. For  _anything_." Nancy smiled at him. "I didn't tell Mom or Dad, right?"

"You told Jonathan."

"Well, he doesn't count."

Mike laughed, and Nancy laughed, too, thought she felt a bit bad—Jonathan  _did_ count, and counted the most. But she meant it more that he was an extension of herself; they were a unit, and what Nancy knew, Jonathan knew.

"Just hold off for a while, okay? You're my baby brother, you know. I'm not ready for you to grow up." She gave his ankle a final squeeze and got off the bed.

Mike nodded, but he looked a bit morose. Nancy didn't move, waiting for what he might say next. "What about when you go to college?" he asked, speaking quietly.

Nancy's heart shattered, then, unexpectedly and nearly completely. College. She would be hours by car, away from her family; Jonathan would be hours by plane, in an entirely different, rather  _scary_ state. Even Steve had left, would be entering his sophomore year at a school in Louisiana. But, she told herself, this was normal. This was good. People grow up. Her brother was clearly beginning to.

"I'll be just a phone call away," she said, giving a final reassuring smile before leaving his room.


End file.
